Causes of Eczema

Video Transcript

"Hi! I'm Dr. David Hill and today we're going to be talking about causes of eczema. Eczema is an allergy that involves the skin. It's related immunologically to the allergy you might have in your nose or in your eyes, or even the asthma that you might experience in your lungs. However, it causes a rash and dryness on the skin. One of the things that makes eczema worse is actually losing the oil from the skin. As the skin becomes drier and cracked, it becomes more susceptible to allergens getting in, and the attack tends to get worse and worse because you'd scratch, it gets drier, more allergen gets in. So, you want to break that cycle by retaining oils in the skin. The first way to keep oils in the skin is to bathe or wash your hands a little bit less. Now, obviously there are some times you really need to bathe and really need to wash your hands, but at those times when you're just doin' it because you do it, think again about whether you really need to. Use cooler water as supposed to hotter water and try to minimize the amount of soap you use. As soon as you get done with the bath, use some sort of moisturizer. The thickest ones are the most effective and the most effective of all is petrolatum jelly like Vaseline. The ones that down from there are creams such as Eucerin, Aquaphor or Cetaphil that you get in a pot. Beyond that, there are things that you can squared out of a pump but the thinner it gets the less protective it's going to be. Now, there are also systemic medications that can help with treating eczema such as antihistamines, like Benadryl, Claritin, Allegra or Zyrtec, and the generic equivalents of those medications. We also apply topical steroids to turn down the immune system where the rash is. Topical steroids include Hydrocortisone over-the-counter and prescription, Betametasone, Mometasone, they go on and on. There are lots of them and you can ask your doctor which one maybe right for you based on the strength of the steroid and the severity of the eczema. Last, we have a group of medications called neuraminidase inhibitors and those include Elidel and Protopic. They also turn down the immune system at the side of the eczema much the way the steroids do. So remember, eczema is an allergy of the skin that causes itching, bumps, scaling and a diffuse rash. It can be treated in a variety of ways but the way to start is to keep well in the skin and add oil to the skin if it's been washed away. Talking about eczema, I'm Dr. David Hill."